From Joseph Amiel, best-selling author of Birthright, Deeds, and Star Time, comes his most compelling work yet. A Question of Proof is a spell-binding and profoundly moving courtroom drama in which a lawyer struggles to defend the woman he loves against the accusation that she murdered her husband.
Tough and street-smart, a principled rebel against an establishment he has always scorned, Dan Lazar has risen from the working class to become one of Philadelphia's top criminal defenders. But now divorced and badly missing his young son, disillusioned by years of representing vicious criminals, humiliated by the politically ambitious DA's charge that he bribed a witness in a brutal rape-homicide case, Dan is burned out, depressed, and ready to call it quits.
On the surface he would seem to have nothing in common with Susan Boelter, the beautiful and patrician wife of Peter Boelter, who runs the city's dominant newspaper and heads one of its most powerful families. But when Peter deserts her and files for divorce, moving to seize everything that is precious to her, including custody of their thirteen-year-old daughter, Susan turns to a reluctant Dan for help. Suddenly, Peter is found dead. Susan becomes the prime suspect in his murder.
Driven by his new-found love for her and by an inner need to defend someone in whose innocence he can truly believe, Dan starts to investigate. He soon discovers a maze of conflicting evidence and of growing doubts and mystery about the woman he thought he knew and loved. And he realizes that the truth he desperately seeks - especially about Peter Boelter's death - depends on finding the answer to a question of proof. From Philadelphia's courtrooms in City Center to the mansions in its moneyed suburbs, A Question of Proof is the gripping story of one man's internal battle between love and justice and the lengths to which a wealthy family will go to hide its secrets.
"Joseph Amiel's book stands head & shoulders above
other popular 'legal' novels. A Question of Proof is brilliantly
crafted from the opening line to the finale. It is the finest
suspense novel I've read in years...entrancing. The outcome
was a mystery to the last sentence. A masterpiece of suspense!
~Gregg Jarrett, Fox News Live, Court TV
"A strong courtroom [drama] that hooks you fast - and pulls you straight through to a knotty, post-courtroom surprise ending...Neat storytelling...you'll never guess who did it."
~Kirkus Reviews
"Joseph Amiel has another winner! A Question of Proof is a legal thriller, taut with suspense, you won't be able to put it down. ~Barry Reed, author of The Verdict and The Choice at last, somebody writing about television has done his homework."
~Jim Ryan, host of Good Day New York,
Fox Television
A QUESTION OF PROOF, a Murder Trial Story That Obsessed Me
Being a lawyer and a writer, I always wanted to combine my two professions by writing a novel about a murder trial, but put it off until I could find just the right characters and plot. When I hit upon Dan Lazar, the tough, brilliant, troubled criminal-defense attorney with a background much like my own; the beautiful socialite Susan Boelter; and her arrogant, willful newspaper-publisher husband, Peter Boelter, the story that entangles them obsessed me from the moment I began writing until I turned it in to my publisher.
A QUESTION OF PROOF takes place in Philadelphia, a city with a unique history and culture that affects everyone in the book. The heart of the story is Dan's love affair with Susan that restores his happiness and then threatens it as he begins to doubt she is innocent of murdering her husband. The ending that has surprised and satisfied so many readers always seemed inevitable to me, given all that has come before.
Like parents with their children, writers love all their books, but each grips their hearts a little differently. I arranged for A QUESTION OF PROOF to be published as an ebook because I wanted it to reach many new readers in the hope they would love it as I do. Please let me know what you think.
Joseph Amiel
New York, NY
Enter your info below to download sample chapters from A Question of Proof,
Star Time, Deeds and Birthright.
